legacy

legacy, in law, generally a gift of property by will or testament. The term is used to denote the disposition of either personal or real property in the event of death.

In Anglo-American law, a legacy of an identified object, such as a particular piece of real estate, or a described object of personal property, is called a specific legacy. A general legacy, on the other hand, would involve such things as a sum of money or a number of objects identified generically, such as any 100 shares of common stock. If the total value of the estate is insufficient to satisfy all legacies, the specific legacies are satisfied first.

A legacy is termed residuary if the beneficiary is to receive only what is left of the estate after the satisfaction of all specific and general legacies.

In civil-law countries (e.g., Germany, Japan) legacy and legatee have somewhat different meanings than in Anglo-American law. In Roman law, upon the death of a person, the totality of his legal rights and duties passed to a universal successor, the heir. If there was no valid testament, the heir was determined by the rules of intestate succession. An heir, however, could also be instituted by testament, and in his testament the testator could charge his heir with legacies—that is, duties to a third party, called a legatee, to whom the heir had to pay certain sums of money or give certain assets of the estate. This terminology is still used in the law of Germany and those countries with similar systems, such as Switzerland and Japan. In the French civil code and those countries that follow its pattern, however, the term heir is limited to the universal intestate successor. A person to whom a testator leaves his entire estate is called a légataire universel; when the estate is divided, the beneficiaries are called légataires à titre universel. A person who is to receive a fixed sum of money or a particular asset of the estate—i.e., a legacy—is called a légataire particulier.